


After I Fall

by thestanceyg



Category: Criminal Minds, Marvel Cinematic Universe, Thor (Movies)
Genre: Character Death, F/M, Government interference, Light Angst, SHIELD, Widowed, dealing with grief
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-01-11
Updated: 2017-03-06
Packaged: 2018-09-16 20:51:05
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 10
Words: 15,365
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9289133
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thestanceyg/pseuds/thestanceyg
Summary: Darcy Lewis, widow, needs to leave London before her grief swallows her whole. She finds escape in the form of a temporary job with the FBI’s BAU.  But this isn’t the escape she planned:  a man that reminds her of her late husband, a government secret, and murder are all on the table as she navigates a world that feels designed to enhance the grief she thought she was leaving behind.  Will she ever be happy again?  (Spoiler alert:  she will if she lets herself.)





	1. The Fall

No one had been more surprised than Darcy when the fling with Intern Ian had turned into something more.  She seriously thought they were going to be one of those couples that went nowhere once the dust settled, but that wasn’t the case.  When Jane had gone back to the US, Darcy had stayed in London and moved in with Ian.  And then, a year later he proposed and they did a quick ceremony with a justice of the peace.  Darcy was an only child whose parents had passed away, and Ian wasn’t close to his at all.  They invited Jane and Erik, but weren’t surprised when neither showed up to the ceremony.  In both cases, it was very likely their absence hadn’t actually been meant to happen.  Both of them had probably gotten wrapped up in science and didn’t even know what day it was.

Darcy had gotten a position at the embassy doing PR, and Ian had gone on to do some incredible research.  And for two glorious years they had been blissfully happy and not very wealthy at all.  Periodically Darcy emailed Jane, but never heard back.  It stung a bit, but she understood.  Jane had a drive and focus that Darcy was no longer part of.  She thought they had been closer than this, so the truth stung a bit.  But she had Ian, and that helped soften everything. 

Then, one normal Wednesday, Ian had been walking home from work and been hit by a car.  Darcy found out when a police officer showed up at her door to inform her of his passing.  She was told he died in transport, so she never even had a chance to say goodbye. 

Instead of crying, she had stared blankly at the officer before asking where she needed to go to start making arrangements.  She was given the number to the hospital morgue, and the officer left.  She looked around their- no _her_ \- apartment and couldn’t bear to be in it a moment longer.  She took off for the hospital on foot needing the movement to keep her mind from falling into despair.  As she walked, she called her boss to tell him she wouldn’t be in tomorrow. 

A week later Ian’s ashes had been spread over the locations they had loved together and most of her possessions had been sold.  Her life now fit neatly into two admittedly large suitcases of mostly clothes and a few pictures.  She handed her apartment key to the landlord and got into an airport bound taxi.  London was Ian, so she had to run away from it or her heartbreak would swallow her whole and she’d never recover.  Only once she was on the plane heading to DC did she finally cry.  But once the plane landed, she dried her cheeks, gathered her bags, and straightened her shoulders.  She had to push ahead or her mind would always be trapped in London.

***

She walked up to the reception desk in the lobby and waited patiently for the man working the desk to notice her.

“I’m Darcy Lewis,” she said.  Suddenly she thought about how much harder everything would have been if she had changed her name.  How much more difficult even a simple introduction would have been.  She swallowed the lump in her throat and pressed on.  “I have an interview at 10.”

The man looked down at his computer screen and clicked a few things.  “Someone will be down for you shortly Ms. Lewis.  Here’s your visitor badge.  It will need to be returned before you leave.”

“Of course,” she said before thanking the man and taking a seat on a rather uncomfortable bench.  It was nearly ten minutes before someone came to get her.

“Darcy Lewis?” a visibly pregnant woman asked.

“I am,” she said with a smile.  “Pleased to meet you.”  She held out her hand.

The woman shook it.  “I’m Jennifer Jareau.  Please follow me.”  Darcy followed her to an elevator bank.  Once the doors shut Jennifer turned to her.  “Normally we wouldn’t look outside the agency to fill this position, but you came with incredible recommendations.”

Darcy bowed her head in agreement.  “Thank you.  I’m happy you decided to meet with me even though I’m outside your normal hiring zone.”

“Well, when Emily Prentiss writes you a recommendation, the BAU listens.”

“Oh,” she said somewhat surprised, “I thought you meant the Ambassador’s letter.”

“That too,” Jennifer said as the elevator dinged softly and slid back open, “but Emily used to work with us.”

“I had no idea.  We had simply worked together a few times.  I don’t even think I told her I was applying here in specific.”

“Well she knows now.  We called her to ask about you.  She couldn’t say enough good things.”

Darcy blushed and stayed silent while Jennifer led her through a few hallways before they entered a conference room.  Waiting for them was a man who stood when they entered.  “Sorry for the change of venue,” he said to Jennifer, “but I thought it might be best to do this somewhere we were less likely to be interrupted.”

“Of course, sir,” Jennifer replied.  “Darcy, this is Aaron Hotchner.  Aaron, this is Darcy Lewis.”  They shook hands and briefly exchanged pleasantries before sitting.  Darcy opened her briefcase and took out a portfolio, sliding a resume to Jennifer and Aaron before pulling out a pen and placing it on her legal pd.  “I brought these just in case you didn’t already have them.  I also have copies of my letters of recommendation and my transcripts.”

“Not necessary at the moment,” Aaron said.  “As you know, this position is temporary.  We are looking for a media liaison to replace JJ while she is on maternity leave.  The position would start immediately so you have time to train with her prior to her departure, and then would last 6-12 months, at which time the temporary position will end.  In that time, you will be fulfilling all of her same duties, which were previously provided to you.  Do you have any questions regarding that?”

“No sir.”  She had carefully read over everything that would be required of her.  She had worked with the media while at the embassy, and while the duties themselves read as very similar to those she had previously tackled, this was definitely an entirely different beast.  Even if she didn’t feel up for it, she needed to get this job because there was very little else that paid well that was currently open.  Hopefully this experience, plus the time and connections, would help her find something else once this temporary position ended.

The interview consisted of the same sort of questions she had been asked during her embassy job interview, so she felt fully prepared for everything they threw at her.  After nearly an hour, things started to wrap up.

“You’ve had a good career at the embassy,” JJ said, “why leave it?”

“It was time to move on to something new.”

“But something temporary?” she pressed.  “Why not wait for something permanent to open up?”

“Sometimes you have to take that small step in order to get to the bigger one,” she said, hoping she had neatly avoided any questions that might connect back to Ian.  She knew that someone had hidden the marriage once the license had hit the databases, and she suspected Shield was trying to protect them.  She wasn’t even sure her previous boss knew she was married.  She rarely spoke about it at work (most of what Ian did was classified and you never knew who was listening).  Such a silly thing, to have secrets like a marriage when she worked with someone so much more powerful than she.  But Ian and Darcy had become each other’s greatest weakness, and it would be very easy to use one to get the other to speak.  And, if she was being honest, it would most likely be torturing her to get Ian to give up details of his own or Jane’s work.  So, maybe not so surprising that it had been hidden after all.  Though now that she thought about it, she did wonder how the police officer knew to tell her about Ian’s death and how the morgue had been so quick to sign over the body.  Maybe that hadn’t been a cop after all….

“In that case, Miss Lewis, I think we’re done here,” Aaron was saying as she pulled herself back out of her thoughts.  “Congratulations.  We’d like to offer you the job.”

“Don’t you need to deliberate or something?” she blurted out before she could stop herself to ask in a more professional manner.

“Nope,” JJ said, much more relaxed than she had been during the interview.  “Once Emily sung your praises, we knew we were going to hire you as long as the interview wasn’t a complete disaster.”

“Oh,” was all she could say as she felt her cheeks grow warm.  “Thank you.”

“Do you have any plans for today?”

“No,” she said.  She had an empty apartment to go back to, but that was about it.

“In that case, care to start shadowing today?”

“Yes, of course, absolutely,” she said nodding vigorously.  Aaron came up and shook her hand. 

“Welcome to the team.  Now, if you’ll excuse me.”  He quickly left the room.

“Does he not like me?”

JJ laughed.  “You’re fine.  He’s just very busy.  That’s how he is.  You’ll get used to it.  C’mon, let’s introduce you to the team and then we can get started on the paperwork.”

“Maybe we should meet each person one at a time, you know, as breaks from the paperwork.”

JJ laughed.  “With this team that’ll be basically impossible.  We’re very close.”

“Are they going to see me as an enemy then?” Darcy asked, suddenly concerned about a hostile work environment.  That would certainly make things harder.

“No, not at all.  They’ll want you to succeed because that means I don’t have to worry about anything other than this one,” she said patting her tummy.  “And honestly,” she added in a conspiratorial whisper, “I want you to be amazing at this because it’s too much work for one person.  If you’re good at it, it will be easier to try and talk them into keeping you on full time.”

“Is there enough work for two people?”

“You have no idea,” JJ sighed.  “Now let’s go meet everyone.”


	2. An Introduction

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Spencer meets Darcy. It raises a lot of questions.

“They’re interviewing someone today, aren’t they?” Morgan asked Rossi as they sat around the desks taking a coffee break before they went back to paperwork.  They had been chatting idly for the past ten minutes when JJ and Hotch had left, spurring a change of topic.

“Kind of,” Rossi said.

“How do you kind of interview someone?” Alex asked.

“As long as she doesn’t screw up, she’s in.”

“Who does she know to get that kind of treatment?” Morgan asked, annoyance coloring his words.

“Prentiss,” Rossi said with a shrug.

“Emily recommended her?” Spencer asked, piping up for the first time.  That was an interesting bit of news. Rossi nodded.

“Well, I’ve never met Emily, but you all really love her, so that’s good right?  That Emily likes her?”  Alex looked between Rossi and Morgan for confirmation.

“We’ll see,” Morgan said.  Spencer sighed and Rossi frowned.  Morgan had been prickly lately and no one was totally sure why.  They had all been trying to ask around the issue, but so far they had had zero luck figuring out what was bothering him.  If they were just a little less busy, they might have met success, but so far Morgan had been hiding behind work, and no one could actually call it an avoidance tactic since he typically was only saying what was true for all of them.

“Even if Emily hadn’t recommended her, we should give her a chance,” Spencer said diplomatically.  “She _is_ going to be working closely with us, so we should try to get along.”  He thought back to how hard he had to work to earn any sort of respect at the Academy.  People had underestimated him and, in some cases, had been flat out mean to him because of his age.  He didn’t want to judge the woman before she was already there simply because she wasn’t JJ.  If Emily liked her then that certainly counted for something to him.

“You kind of sound like a Hallmark card, kid,” Morgan said before sitting back down at his desk.  Spencer didn’t know how he felt about that comment.  It wasn’t said as a dig at him, but it still felt pointed.  “It doesn’t matter anyway.  It’s probably a done deal.  Might as well get back to work.  We’ll meet her when we meet her.”  He pulled a folder back to him, clearly disengaging from the rest of them.

Spencer looked over at Alex who just shrugged at him.  Rossi gave him a similar look.  No one was quite clear on what was up with Morgan, but it seemed chatting time was over as far as he was concerned.  The group broke apart after that and everyone quietly got back to work.  However, everyone’s head was on a swivel when Hotch came back in an hour later, making a beeline for his own office.  JJ wasn’t with him.  Spencer decided it was time for another cup of coffee since he didn’t want to be caught up in the speculation of what it meant that Hotch came back alone.  He had a feeling Morgan was going to be a downer, and he wasn’t interested in listening to that.

When he entered the breakroom, he was surprised to see it was already occupied.  “Reid!  Hey!” JJ said brightly.  “This is Darcy Lewis, she’s going to be my maternity replacement.  Darcy, this is Dr. Spencer Reid.  He’s part of our team.”

“Pleased to meet you,” she said quietly, holding out her hand.  Her eyes had gone oddly wide when she first looked at him before becoming somewhat shuttered.  She looked like she had recently been sick.  She was thin, but in a bony, recent weight loss sort of way.  There were circles under her eyes that had mostly been hidden by careful make-up application.  But despite this, she was clearly a beautiful woman.  Her hair was long brown waves that tumbled down below her shoulders and her eyes were a blue that would sparkle if she wasn’t so sad.  He hated touching, but she felt like the kind of person that really could use a hug, and he was surprised to find he would gladly offer her one.  Usually he only felt that way with friends he had known for a while.  Instead, he took her offered hand.

“The pleasure is all mine.  Do you have a hint of an accent?”

“It’s probably just left over from my time in London.  I pick up the vocal inflections of my surroundings very easily.  Something I’ll have to be careful of when doing press conferences.”  He could hear her fighting the accent that refused to be totally silenced.

“How long were you in London?”  She had long since dropped his hand, but his hand tingled as though hers were still wrapped in it.  He made a fist and then flexed his fingers, but her phantom hand still haunted him.

“A couple years.”

“When did you leave?”  She hadn’t quite dropped the accent yet, so it must have been recent.

“About two weeks ago.”  That was more recent than he would have guessed.

“What brought you here?”

“I guess this did,” she said with a smile and small shrug.  She clearly didn’t want to talk about why she had left London, but he couldn’t help but think that it had something to do with why she had difficulty looking him in the eye and why she looked so worn down. He wondered if JJ and Hotch had noticed her appearance, or if they just thought that’s how she looked.  He had never met her before, but he had the distinct feeling this wasn’t her normal appearance.

“Well, the coffee here isn’t great, but it’s hot,” he said casting about for a new topic while pulling out the pot.

“As long as there’s a ton of sugar to put in it, I’ll be fine,” she said, grabbing a mug from the shelf for herself.

“Ahh, there you and Reid will definitely get along,” JJ laughed.  “Sometimes I think there’s more sugar in his cup than coffee.”

“He must be a sweet guy,” Darcy said before quickly clamping her mouth shut and moving over to the pot he had just put down, turning her body from the two of them so they couldn’t see her face as she poured.

JJ raised her eyebrows at him, but he chose to ignore it, instead reaching for the sugar and pouring a generous helping into his mug before sliding it down the counter to Darcy.  “So what’s the plan for today?” he asked to lighten the tension.

“Mostly I’m going to introduce Darcy to everyone and then get started on the paperwork.  I don’t know how much time we’ll have before we’re out in the field again, so I want to try and get done as much of the office stuff as I can right away.”

“Welcome to the team,” Spencer said lifting his mug like a little toast.  Darcy smiled and raised her mug as well before following JJ out of the room.  He leaned against the counter and watched them go.  There was something going on with Darcy Lewis, and he was intrigued.  He waited a beat longer before following them back out to the desks.  JJ was already introducing Darcy to everyone, and he noticed that her body language had changed.  She was more open and warm than she had been in the break room.  Was that because she was prepared to meet everyone and she hadn’t been ready in the breakroom, or was there something about him?

He shook off that thought.  How could it have anything to do with him?  They didn’t know each other before this.  He watched as she smiled brightly while shaking hands with everyone and making little jokes that brought a few chuckles.  He rejoined the group just after Alex had been introduced.  He needed to stop thinking about her like someone to be profiled.  He’d learn more about her over time.

“Have you meet Spencer yet?” Alex asked as he came to a stop next to her.

“We met getting coffee,” she said holding up her mug but not looking directly at him, instead focusing her answer to Alex.

“Then that’s everyone except Garcia,” JJ said clapping her hands.

“You better get over there.  She’ll never forgive you if you forget her,” Rossi teased.

“Forget Penelope?” Morgan asked.  “Like that’s possible.”

“We’ll let you all get back to paperwork.  I should finish introductions and then get Darcy started on our own pile.”  JJ grimaced a little at the thought of the stack of files awaiting them.  Spencer did not envy JJ’s workload.  It was much more than any of theirs, save Hotch. Everyone wished Darcy luck and then they were gone.

“Sooo,” Rossi said, “what did we all think?”

“I liked her,” Alex said without hesitation.  “I want to see how well she handles a case, but she seems friendly and sharp, which are both great assets.”

“She seemed nice,” Morgan hedged, “but it’s too early to make any decisions.”  It was a better assessment than Spencer had thought he would give her.  He had expected Morgan to dislike her simply because she was new and he seemed to have a stick up his ass.

“Well I think she seems like a sweet girl, but I have a feeling she has a steel spine.  I think she’ll fit right in,” Rossi declared.  “What about you, Reid?”

“I’m interested in getting to know her better.  I think there’s a lot there that we haven’t seen yet.”

Everyone nodded and got back to work now that the excitement had passed.  But Spencer couldn’t stop thinking about Darcy.  Why didn’t she look at him?  What had made her leave London?  Was he just imagining that she was treating him differently than the others?  And if not, what made him different?  He had a lot of questions, but no idea how to answer them.


	3. First Impressions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Darcy reflects on the team.

Darcy threw her coat and bag on the couch as she made her way to the small kitchen.  The day had been long and busy, which she was grateful for.  There was a lot to learn.  While a lot of the general press duties were the same, there was a different set of details to learn.  Then, she also had to help select the cases that they would actually travel to when invited, and deal with those that they declined to travel to.  JJ had been right, it was enough work for two people.  It was also a lot of responsibility.  If she made the wrong choice, took them to the wrong case, she would be directly responsible for deaths.  That wasn’t a pressure that she normally felt at the embassy.  Luckily, though, she had a good team to work with.  Well, at least she assumed so from her first impressions and the way JJ spoke so highly of everyone.  After their introductions she hadn’t spent any time with the other team members.  They had gone straight to the frankly enormous pile of case folders and got straight to work.

It was a good overwhelming, though.  It kept her mind busy and engaged.  For most of the day she hadn’t thought about Ian at all.  But when she had thought about him, it had taken all her willpower to keep up her professional mask.  Dr. Reid was going to be difficult to work with.  He reminded her so much of Ian that it almost hurt.  Physically he was similar, and he was obviously whip smart just like Ian had been.  He had a slightly awkward air that reminded her of Ian when they first met.

When she had met Spencer in the breakroom, she hadn’t been prepared; hadn’t even considered the possibility that someone would be a gut punch reminder of her late husband.  But there he was.  Ian had always been her type, and there was Spencer filling her type almost better than Ian had.  She loved tall men that were lanky in that Marc Jacobs model sort of way.  When she took him in, she had felt that familiar pang of desire that made her stomach flutter.  She had to look away from him just to be able to speak.  She sighed, annoyed.  Ian had been gone less than a month and she was already feeling attracted to someone else.  She was disgusted with herself.  She tried to remind herself that she had been attracted to people when they were together too, that physical attraction wasn’t a form of cheating; but that just made her think about how it wasn’t cheating if there was no one to cheat on.  Could you cheat on a memory?  Was that a thing?

She moved into the stove to make some chamomile tea.  Back in London she would have poured a glass of wine after a long day and sat in the loveseat next to Ian and listened to him chat about what had happened in the lab that day.  She would have rested her head on his shoulder and breathed deeply, letting the smell that was distinctly him calm her thoughts and drain the tension from her.  They would have sat there like that, idly holding hands and discussing their day for hours.  But she knew herself.  She wouldn’t be able to drink again until the thought of Ian didn’t make her body feel like sadness was a pressure building in her, desperate to get out.  She would drink a bottle, not a glass, hoping to drown the memories in the hazy buzz of alcohol, and that was someone she didn’t want to be.  So tea would be her nighttime release from now on.  It was a poor substitute, but what other option did she have?  The emotional upheaval she was feeling at the guilt of finding Dr. Reid attractive; the stray thought of laying her head against his shoulder and unburdening the day; threatened to consume her, and she really didn’t need that right now.  She had been hanging on so wonderfully before this train of thought.

While the kettle warmed, she looked around her tiny apartment.  It had come furnished, which was good because she owned nothing.  The place still looked like it was empty and waiting for an occupant.  She had only unpacked one of her two suitcases, and that had been out of necessity.  It held all her work clothes and toiletries.  The other bag had been put into a closet.  It held her casual clothes, but also a few of Ian’s sweaters and all her pictures of him.  She wasn’t sure if she was ready to open that one yet, but she was happy that it was there where she could get to it if she wanted to.  She wanted to pull out one of his sweaters and pull it on, smelling him around her, but she couldn’t.  After her traitorous thoughts that wasn’t something she deserved.

The kettle whistled and Darcy set about brewing her tea.  The other team members had been interesting.  Aaron was a very terse, closed off man.  He seemed to always be serious and standoffish.  JJ had assured her that it had nothing to do with her as a person.  He’d open up eventually, but, like a reality show contestant, he wasn’t there to make friends.  He was going to do his job and expected everyone to do theirs as well.  JJ claimed he would unfurl a bit once he realized she was dependable, but she wasn’t so sure.  She’d have to see him with the others before she actually believed it.

Rossi, on the other hand, was gregarious while still being sharp.  He reminded her of a teddy bear that wasn’t going to take your shit.  She had instantly liked him.  He vaguely reminded her of her father in that he would probably cheer her on and support her, but also call her to the carpet if she needed it.  She instantly wanted to do her best so as not to disappoint him.  That was the kind of leadership she did best under.  He made her want to be good just so as not to disappoint him.

Derek was another tough one to figure out.  He initially seemed like the meat-head enforcer type that she had hated in high school.  And while she thought he had a bit of an attitude, she could see that he cared deeply about his team.  He had an almost protective stance near Alex, and the way his face had softened when he mentioned Penelope made her think he just might have a gooey center.  He wasn’t willing to show his soft belly to her yet, but she could wear him down.

Alex reminded her a lot of Jane.  She wasn’t as slight or as absent minded as Jane, but she was smart and fierce.  Meeting her hadn’t hurt like meeting Spencer had, but it did open up a hollow space in her that couldn’t be filled by anyone but Jane.  God she missed Jane.  Jane was probably the best friend she had ever had.  She had always had plenty of friends before New Mexico, but none of them had gotten under her skin and taken root like Jane had.  Maybe life threatening events did that to people.  Jane, apparently, did not feel the same way.  It hurt that they hadn’t been on the same page, that she had been so forgettable to Jane.

She needed to stop thinking about it.  She had lost Jane a while ago.  She should be over it by now.

She had met Penelope last.  That girl was fun.  She was sort of like the rainbow after a storm.  The BAU was dark and stormy, but there was Penelope Garcia, incapable of being anything other than an absolute ray of sunshine.  She was loud and nice and unapologetic about it. Maybe if she hung out with her some more she could shake off some of her own storm clouds.  And if it didn’t help, well, at least she had made a friend.  Penelope seemed like the type of person that would be the best kind of friend.

Nope.  Not going down that road.  Not thinking about being good friends.

The timer went off, and Darcy pulled the tea bag from her mug and moved to the small chair, avoiding the couch.  It would just feel empty to sit there all alone.  She held the mug close to her face and breathed in the aroma of her tea while focusing her breathing.  She would be fine.  She just needed to not think about any of the things she had lost. 

Easier said than done.

She tried to think only of her breathing, in and out, clearing her mind as she focused on just her breath.  After several minutes of just breathing, she opened her eyes and sipped her tea.  She could do this if she was strong enough.  And she would be, or it might kill her.


	4. Over Analyze

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Spence can't focus.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Heyyyyy. Sorry about the disappearing act. I can't guarantee that I won't do it again because the world being on fire kinda messed with my creativity.

The list of things that Spencer Reid hated was short, but today he was going to add “the location of JJ’s office” to that list.  The problem was that it was behind him.  Which meant he couldn’t see it without being obvious.  Which meant he couldn’t surreptitiously observe Darcy.  She had been with them for three days now and he couldn’t shake that there was something going on there.  And, more baffling, no one else seemed to share this belief.  Not that he had asked anyone.  It was clear from the way they spoke and acted that they didn’t think anything at all was amiss.  Maybe amiss wasn’t the right word.  The problem was that no one else seemed to see that the baseline Darcy Lewis they were getting was actually below her baseline.  Something was pulling her down, he was sure of it, but no one else seemed to notice. 

He was fixating again.  He needed something else to occupy him.  Besides the case files in front of him, of course.  Those he could work through with just a quarter of his brain focused on it, which left plenty of brain space for overanalyzing.  He pulled a blank notepad toward him.  Maybe the best way to deal with the Darcy issue was to purge his mind of everything he had observed so far.  He flipped his pen in his hand for just a moment while he determined if this was the best course of action.  It maybe wasn’t the best course, but it was better than inaction.  He started writing.

  * _She won’t look me in the eye. Examples:  group introduction, every time we end up in the breakroom together, yesterday at the team meeting where I was talking about linguistic preferences_
  * _She avoids being alone with me. Examples:  has left the supply room without supplies twice when finding me already there, nearly ran into Rossi when trying to leave the conference room when she realized it was only me in there_
  * _Didn’t even say she couldn’t attend when I invited the team to the movies with me_
  * _Asked Alex to explain a linguistic detail in an unsub letter that I was better suited (and available) to answer_
  * _Pulled her hand away quickly when our hands brushed while I was handing out folders_



He looked at his list.  A lot of it was circumstantial at best.  Maybe she forgot what she came into the supply closet for.  That happened to people.  She could be concerned about germs, just being unhappy about the hand brush.  Maybe she didn’t realize that he was a better choice than Alex for her specific question; she was new after all.  He flipped the pad over and slid it under a pile.  All the list had done was make him want to overanalyze every item.  Perhaps “out of sight, out of mind” was the best choice.

He cast about for something else to focus on, and his eyes fell on Morgan.  That would do.

Currently Morgan was working on the folder in front of him.  His desk was different, though.  Something was out of place.  Spencer let his eyes glide over the surface.  The picture frame.  That’s what was different.  Normally, there was a frame for a 5 x 7 photo sitting on the corner of his space, but now the frame was for a 4 x 6 photo.  A subtle difference, but one nonetheless.  That meant the picture was different too.  He couldn’t tell what it was since the frame was facing Morgan and, thus, the back was to him.  Maybe that had something to do with why he was acting somewhat standoffish.  He looked at his coffee mug.  It was about half full.  He took a sip.  Based on his normal rate of consumption, he would need to fill it in about ten more minutes.

“Hey Reid,” Alex called from her desk across the aisle. “Can you take a look at this with me?  I think I might be overreaching, but if I’m not...” She trailed off as she turned back to her computer screen.  “Just, take a look?”

Spencer got up and looked over her shoulder to the screen.  “What are you seeing here?”

She pointed at the screen.  “Look at this this, and this,” she tapped the screen with her pencil eraser.

Spencer took a moment to look at the phrases.  He had already read the entire letter she was looking at when she called him over, and his mind whirred with what Alex was asking him to identify.  “Those phrases are highly unlikely to be used by the same individual,” he finally said.  “They’re too linguistically dissimilar.  Those are phrases that are from different locations and time periods.”

“Right?” She asked, leaning back a bit.  “They’re phrases that are typically holdovers from childhood, but that would mean,”

“That there are two people,” he said, completing her thought.  “I agree.  Linguistically this isn’t the same person.”

Alex pulled her folder toward her.  “That’s what I thought, but the profile best fits with this linguistic print.”  She tapped one of the phrases.

“So is it one person getting some phrasing help or is it a team?”

“This is a little crazy, but with the way the letter reads it’s almost…narrative?  Written like a story?”

“Writing group,” Spencer suddenly said.  “Someone is unwittingly helping write these letters because they think they’re for something else.”

“And these letters haven’t been made public, so they have no idea what they’re actually helping with.”

“No, I agree,” Spencer said leaning against the desk behind him.  “But do you release it and hope the coauthor comes forward?”

“We should talk to JJ,” Alex said standing up and grabbing the folder.  Spencer followed her to JJ’s office.  “Got a moment?” she asked from the doorway, waving the folder a bit.

“Of course.  Pull up some chairs.”

JJ was behind the desk with Darcy more near the corner as they looked over folders.  Darcy had a notebook open where she was working on not cases, but details for the job.  Alex pulled a chair up to the desk.  The only place for Spencer to add his own was between Alex and Darcy.  As he sat, Alex started going into detail about the case and what they had discovered.  Darcy paid rapt attention to Alex, eyes focused on her as she spoke.

“I called Spencer over,” she said, eyes flicking to him, as did JJ’s, but not Darcy’s, “and we came to the same conclusion, there’s someone helping craft these letters, most likely unwittingly.”

“The way these phrases crop up is similar to a document being edited by someone with a different linguistic pattern,” Spencer said.  Darcy’s eyes were on the wall behind him, though her head had turned to him.  “We think it’s a writing partner that, most likely, is unaware of what they are actually editing.”

“So what do you think needs to be done?” Darcy asked, addressing her question to Alex, which was fair.  She was the one consulting on this case.  He still couldn’t help but think that she would have done this if it had been his, though.

“I think very specific passages of the letter need to be released, specifically the parts that are clearly from the editor.  You can determine if this is actually the editor based on their language during an interview.”

“Would the interview need to be taped?”  JJ asked, writing on a pad.

“Ideally.  Especially if they don’t have anyone with a strong linguistic background.”

“Great.  Thanks,” JJ said before taking the folder and turning to Darcy. “You ready for your first phone call?”

“I don’t think I should wait until I’m ready because then you’ll never get to leave,” Darcy said with a fond smile.  JJ had that sort of effect on people.  Spencer was taken by how lovely Darcy’s face was when it wasn’t tense like it normally was with him. 

“Do you need us?”

“No, this is good,” JJ said taking the folder from Alex.  “Thanks guys.”

They moved their chairs back and offered a wave goodbye.  Darcy didn’t look up at all.

“I think I need new coffee,” Spencer said looking at his mug that now held cold coffee.  “Want some?” he asked Alex.

“Goodness yes,” she sighed.  “Thanks Spence.”

When he brought back the full mugs he was able to get a look at Morgan’s desk.  The frame that used to hold a photo of his girlfriend now held an old family snapshot that was at least 20 years old.  Spencer wasn’t sure what to make of that.  He’d need to do some more data gathering.  Maybe they broke up? That would explain the short fuse.  At least he now had a starting point.


	5. A Complication

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Darcy wasn't expecting this surprise.

Darcy had been at her new job for a full week, and someone must have been looking down on her because they hadn’t had to go into the field yet.  There was so much to learn, and she was grateful that she had been able to get a handle on the job before she learned the nuances of being in the field.  JJ had left early today for a doctor’s appointment, and Darcy had treated it like a test to see what she knew and what she still didn’t know.  She had made a list of questions to ask JJ tomorrow and had been the last one to leave the office.  Rossi had popped his head in when he was leaving to check on her and remind her to not work too late. 

She had taken his words to heart and left around 8, grabbing takeout on her way home as a small reward for her hard work (and because she was too tired to actually cook).  She poured herself a glass of water and grabbed her laptop, taking the still warm bag of curry to the couch.  She had plans to watch a movie or two before bed.  She still had difficulty sleeping.  It was hard to sleep in an empty bed, but the bed felt different and smelled different than the one she and Ian had shared, and that helped, but not enough to allow her to get regular amounts of sleep.  She made a mental note to buy another concealer stick to hide the dark circles under her eyes. Watching movies helped sometimes.  She would let them play as she dozed off so she wouldn’t hear the silence that felt heavy without the soft sounds of Ian breathing.  That’s what she was planning to do tonight.

She booted up her laptop while she arranged her dinner and checked her personal email even though she hadn’t gotten anything that wasn’t junk in quite a while.  There was an email from an address she didn’t recognize, but the subject line was a phrase she and Jane had used as a sort of code when they thought they were being listened to all those years ago in New Mexico.  She hesitated for just a moment before she decided to open it.

_I hope this gets through.  I haven’t heard from you in ages.  At first I thought it was because you were busy being young and in love, but now I’m not so sure.  I looked at your work website and saw you weren’t listed there anymore.  Then I realized that somehow I had lost all track of how long it had been since we actually physically talked.  It’s been over two years since you’ve responded like yourself to something I sent you, and you’ve never returned a voicemail I left.  I don’t think that’s really you, so now I’m worried. It took a lot of time and careful planning, but I found a hacker that promised me this email address wasn’t traceable back to me and showed me how to jump onto a secure but anonymous network, so hopefully this gets to you.  I think someone’s keeping us apart, and I don’t know why.  But I miss you and I need you.  Reply back with our response phrase so I know it’s you.  Love you._

The sound of her phone buzzing startled Darcy out of rereading the email for the third time.  Jane had been emailing her, just like she had been emailing Jane, and she hadn’t received a single response.  And all those calls that had gone to voicemail, never to be returned. God, more than two years would mean Jane probably didn’t even know that she and Ian had married, and certainly not what had happened recently (though she had left another rambling voicemail).

It was too much.  The tears streamed down her face.  Fucking Shield screwing with her life again.  They had taken Jane’s work in New Mexico and now they had taken Jane herself.  Keeping her from Jane; making her think Jane had abandoned her first in a time of happiness and then in a time of great sadness and need was such a shady Shield thing to do.  And she was certain it was Shield.  That was just their sort of manipulation.  What had they been hoping to gain?  Had they thought isolating Jane would lead her to do something for them?  Because they hadn’t done their homework if that’s what they thought.  Jane might get lost in the science fairly frequently, but she wasn’t the type to trust easily.

She fumbled with her glass as her eyes blurred with tears for all she had missed with the woman she had thought to be her best friend until she had been unceremoniously dropped.  A dropping that apparently never happened.  A new thought entered her mind.  Two years _since she had responded like herself_.  Someone had been responding to Jane because it hadn’t been her.  Jane and her glorious big brain, though, knew that it wasn’t Darcy, that it didn’t sound like her.  And then she had _done something about it_.  She hadn’t lost her friend because her friend cared.  She cared so much that she took time away from her research to try and figure out what was going on.  And Jane had _left her voicemails_ that she had never received.  This was much deeper and more detailed than she would have expected from Shield.

Jesus fuck she was mad. What had she missed in Jane’s life because of this interference?  That helped her focus and stop the deluge of tears enough to see what she was doing. She needed to find a secure way to respond to Jane.  They were going to fucking _wreck_ Shield for what they did.  Don’t mess with friendships formed in fire, you absolute assholes.  Shield might be a shady government organization, but two women scorned were going to destroy them.

She needed to think.  How could she get in touch with Jane?  Her life had been fairly isolated both in London and since the move, but she had an idea of who she might be able to call that could help her out.  The question was, though, how to approach a new acquaintance to get her help finding a way to respond to Jane without giving anything away.

Tricky business asking a government employee to help find a way to keep the government from knowing what she was up to.

Darcy grabbed a pen and wrote down the email address before marking the message as spam.  Hopefully that would throw off anyone that might be bugging her email.  She was fairly certain it was more of a blocking her from sending to certain email addresses or bouncing out emails from certain addresses than it was any sort of active monitoring, but better safe than sorry.  She took moved laptop out of her lap and back to the couch and pulled out her phone.  The message she had gotten earlier was from JJ.  She was simply curious how the rest of the day had gone.  Darcy shot of a quick response, and spent the next few minutes texting with JJ.

It was time for Netflix.  Movies and curry were the best way to let her mind rest.  There was too much crammed in there now, and she wouldn’t be able to properly digest any of it if she didn’t give everything a rest so she could fully function.  Dealing with the new job would be grueling enough, but adding Shield and Jane to the mix was going to take everything she had.  She rolled her shoulders and briefly closed her eyes, focusing on her breathing.  One day at a time.  Tomorrow was early enough to start taking on (and possibly setting fire to) the world.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys! I have a fic giveaway series happening on tumblr. So far I've given away 2 out of 5 prompts. I'll be putting them all into a series when all 5 are done. Make sure you're following me for your chance at numbers 3-5!


	6. Perfectly Yourself

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Spencer puzzles over an encounter with Darcy.

Darcy Lewis had a problem with him.  He was sure of it, but he had no idea why.  At first he thought that he was reading too much into the few interactions he had with her, but how much evidence was too much to ignore?  How many pages of notes were necessary for him to be correct?

In conversations she rarely looked at him, even when he was speaking, though she did look at everyone else.  Sort of like she was doing now.  The team was sitting around the table discussing a case that Rossi was going to consult on while he was visiting his daughter.  He had been patched in on the screen, and they were discussing different avenues that he might want to pursue.

“Make sure their tech person has checked the Xbox for online activity,” Penelope said.  “That’s one that some places don’t think about.”  Darcy was nodding her head and only looked away from Garcia to jot some notes on the pad in front of her.

“You might also want to run a geographic profile based on proximity to abandoned real estate.  That might be where the unsub is going to ground after kills,” Spencer added.  He made another tick mark on his paper.  That was the third time this meeting she didn’t look at him when he was speaking and the seventh time that day.  It wasn’t even noon yet.

“Lots of great ideas.  Thanks guys.”

“Keep us posted,” Hotch said before disconnecting the call and addressing the room.  “As a reminder, I’ll be calling each of you in for your performance review.  It’s best that we get it done during this unusually slow period.  Also, double check your go-bag to make sure you aren’t missing anything.  Whenever we have a longer stretch without using them, someone always ends up with a missing item.”

He watched Darcy write “Go bag???” on her notes page and circle it.  How had no one mentioned that to her yet?  Hotch dismissed the team and was out the door, quickly followed by Penelope and Alex who was doing her review.

“So what’s a go bag?” Darcy asked JJ.

“I can’t believe I haven’t mentioned that to you yet,” JJ said sitting back down.  “Sorry.  Must be pregnancy brain.  A go bag is a packed suitcase that sits here at the office so that you’re ready to go out to the field on a moment’s notice.”  Darcy had flinched slightly at the words “packed suitcase.”  Spencer wrote that on his pad while Morgan joined the conversation.

“Basically you want to make sure you have clothes, toiletries, things like that.”

“I like to have a personal item or two in there also because sometimes we’re gone for a long time.”

“Like what?”

“I have one of my husband’s old t-shirts.”  Darcy paled; he added to his notes.

“I have a picture of my family when I was a kid,” Morgan volunteered.  Spencer filed that away, wondering if he meant the same one that was now on his desk.

“What about you Spence?”

“A copy of my mom’s favorite book with her notes in the margin.”  He added another tally mark to his list.

“Basically anything to help you not feel so alone,” JJ said with a shrug.  “Sometimes the field makes you think the worst of the world, and it’s nice to have some comfort.”

Darcy nodded, but had a bit of a wild, cornered look that no one else seemed to notice.  Morgan hit him with a note pad.  “C’mon kid.  Let’s go tackle some more files and then grab lunch.”  Spencer followed him, but as he left he heard Darcy ask, “Do we share hotel rooms?”  which might have been a non-sequitur, but something told him it wasn’t.  He wrote it on his pad as he walked out of the room.

By six, everyone was clearing off their desks and getting ready to head home for the night, but Spencer wasn’t quite done for the day.  “You sure?” Morgan asked when Spencer told him he was fine to finish up on his own.

“I’m good,” he said, waving the man off.  Morgan turned to leave and Spencer found himself mostly alone.  Two hours later he gathered the files he was done with and took them up to JJ’s office to drop them into her box so she could send them back out where they needed to go once she had all the pieces.  The desk light was still on, but it wasn’t JJ sitting there, but Darcy.  She was face down in a folder, her soft, even breaths telling him she was asleep.

Spencer was at a bit of a loss.  Should he wake her up?  On one hand, she should, at the very least, move to the couch so she didn’t get a crick in her neck.  On the other hand, he hadn’t seen her look this peaceful the entire time he had known her.  Then again, she might not take kindly to him, of all people, waking her.  While she might not like him being the one to wake her, she would still probably appreciate the gesture.  He lightly shook her shoulder.  “Darcy,” he called, “you need to wake up.”

She twisted a bit and mumbled, “Just a few more minutes dear.”  He shook her a bit more, calling her name again.  She swatted at his hand and then grabbed his wrist and tried to pull him toward her.  “Shhhh,” she cooed.  “I’m sleeping and you should be too.  C’mon.”

He panicked.  “It’s Spencer,” he said more loudly.  “You’re at work.”

Suddenly she bolted up, eyes widening as she took him in before groaning and closing her eyes completely.  “Did I accost you?” she asked without opening her eyes.  She couldn’t even look at him when there was no one else in the room.

“Not unless telling me I should be sleeping and trying to pull me onto the desk counts.”

She scrunched her eyes tight before opening them up and looking at him for possibly the first time that day.  “I’m so sorry Spencer.  I was dreaming about someone else.”  As she said the words he could see her eyes start to water before she took a deep breath and willed away the tears that had been forming.

“I’m sorry too.”

“For what?” she asked, her eyes searching his face, truly looking at him for a change.

“For not being who you wanted me to be,” he said before turning to leave.

“You’re perfectly yourself,” she said so softly he almost missed it.  “And that’s the problem.”

He thought about her words long after he had gotten home.  He sat in his favorite chair with his pad of notes he had taken about Darcy and tried to crack the puzzle that she was.  He had seen her tear up more than once now, but he couldn’t find a connection between the instances.  There seemed to be no rhyme or reason to whatever was causing them.  She was, however, almost an expert at hiding them.  While he wasn’t around her all the time, he had yet to see her have to hide tears from anyone but him.

Which brought him back to the fact that Darcy Lewis had a problem with him.  And that problem didn’t seem to be that he wasn’t who she wanted him to be, but, rather, that he was exactly himself.

And he was no closer to understanding what that meant.


	7. Nostalgia

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Darcy is firmly in the anger portion of grief, but it's mostly directed toward herself when she starts taking trips down memory lane.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have a fluffy one shot that's been tickling my brain all weekend that I might get to work on today, time permitting. I'm working on the final details for a trip to a quilting convention at the end of the month, and there's still a lot to work out, so we shall see how much writing takes a back seat.

“Hey, can you give these to Garcia and see if she’s done with the online profile for the last case we sent her way?”

“Of course,” Darcy said standing and smoothing her skirt.  She had been looking for an excuse to see Penelope for the past week, but she never seemed to have a chance to be alone with the woman, and here JJ was handing her an opportunity.  She snagged her mug and waved her hand over JJ’s.  “Want a refill?”

“Can’t,” she said sadly.  “That was my one allotted cup of decaf for the day.”

“Hot water with honey and lemon?”

“Is that possible?”

“You’d be surprised what a little break room know-how can make happen.  I’ve worked magic in break rooms much more dismal than the one here, so I think it’s possible.”

“Then yes,” JJ said with a broad, mirthful smile, “I’d love some hot water with honey and lemon.”

She swept up the mug and took off down the hall.  First Penelope, then beverages.  That way they wouldn’t go cold before she got back.  She took off to the tech maven’s office, smiling at Rossi and Alex as she passed them.  She knocked on the closed door.

“Come in!” Penelope called cheerfully.

Darcy opened the door and started talking immediately.  “Hello!  JJ wanted me to drop these off and find out how it was going with the case we gave you yesterday.”  She trailed off at the end as she realized Penelope was not alone.  Sitting in her second chair was Spencer.  She felt herself clam up.  He was wearing a navy blue cardigan that looked much like the one that Ian had been wearing the last time she had seen him.  It was a birthday present she had splurged on for him.  He thought it made him look like Mr. Rogers.  She thought it made him look like a sexy scientist.  Seeing the same look on Spencer made her think about how good Ian had looked and how Spencer filled it out just as well as Ian ever did.  She instantly felt bad for thinking about the relative physical attractiveness of Spencer, and was certain she had grimaced a bit.  She tried to smooth her face back to neutral.

Penelope, bless her, hadn’t noticed her inner turmoil because her back had been to Darcy when she entered.  “It’s right here,” she said digging through a pile next to her for a moment before pulling out a folder and spinning her chair to face Darcy.  “Here you go.”

“Err, thanks,” she said, taking her eyes off Spencer’s chest and plastering a smile on her face.  “These are for you.  Sorry it’s a two for one deal.”

“No problem,” Garcia chirped, still oblivious that anything was wrong. “Reid and I were just talking about JJ’s baby shower.  Wanna help us?”

“I, uh…”

“Maybe another time,” Spencer said, causing her to look at him again.  “I’ve got to get back to work.”  He pursed his lips and then raised his eyebrows and awkwardly stood to leave.

“When are we gonna finish this though?”

“Let me get some stuff done and I’ll come back,” he said before shoving his hands in his pockets and leaving.

“Well that was abrupt.”

“Is that, not normal for him?” Darcy asked, totally aware that she had caused his departure.

“Not really,” she said with a little tilt of her head.

“Since we’re alone,” Darcy said sliding into the chair he had vacated.  “I was wondering if you might be able to help me with something.”

“Maybe.  What’s up?”

“I…I don’t want this to get around, so if this could stay between us, even if you don’t help, I’d appreciate it.”  Penelope’s brow furrowed and she nodded for Darcy to continue.  “So, I, uhm, have this ex that works for the government in a job kind of like yours.  I’m pretty sure he’s been messing with my email via his job.  I can’t prove it, of course, but, just, is there a way to send email so that he can’t track me?”

Garcia’s eyes were wide.  “What do you think he’s doing?”

“I haven’t heard from one of my good friends in months, and that’s not really her.  Even if it’s just one word she usually responds.  I think he might be blocking somehow?  I don’t know if it’s mine or hers, or even if there’s others, but there’s something going on.”

Penelope pushed her glasses up her nose and sat up straight in her seat.  “This isn’t the first time he’s tried to control you like this, is it?”

“It was a big part of why we broke up.”

Penelope nodded and started typing and a stream of code flew across the screen.  “Okay,” she said after a few minutes, “how much do you know about coding.”

“Not as much as you,” she said, thinking back to Thor’s ID, “but some.”

“Alright, pull your chair up here and let me show you what to do.”

Ten minutes later Darcy was leaving Garcia’s office armed with everything she needed to email Jane back.  She’d bake some thank-you cookies tonight.  She was running through the recipe in her head and making a grocery list as she entered the break room to get the hot water and coffee.

“Oh!  Hello Darcy.”

She wanted to groan.  Spencer.  Again.  “Dr. Reid,” she said with a nod before opening the refrigerator to pull out the small lunch bag she had put in there.  She immediately regretted using his title.  Ian had been a Dr. too.  She had been so proud of him.

“Are you,” he said before trailing off and shutting his mouth.

She reached into her bag and pulled out the lemon and knife she had brought with her.  “Am I what?” she asked as she focused on slicing the lemon.

“Are you having a good day?”

_Yes, I now know how to get in touch with Jane.  No, you remind me of my late husband every time I look at you._ “Yes, thank you.  Are you?”  If he was going to chicken out of asking what he really wanted to, she wasn’t about to supply any unnecessary details.

“I’m not sure,” he said as he poured sugar into his coffee.  Ian had hated sweet coffee.  He only ever drank it black.  He liked to tease her that he was sweet enough without it, but she could use all the help she could get.  God she missed teasing each other; bumping hips in the kitchen while they cooked dinner together; the upturn of his voice when he said something he knew was going to set her off; and the sparkle in his eye as he listened while she ranted. The unexpected memory burned her eyes and a tear dropped down.  “Are you sure you’re having a good day?” Spencer asked.  She didn’t look at him, but she could feel that he had come closer to her, that he had seen her eyes well up.

“Fine.  Just some lemon juice in my eye,” she croaked out over the lump in her throat.

It was a clear lie, but he didn’t call her on it.  Instead he handed her a napkin and, blessedly, left.  As soon as he was gone she dropped the knife and lemon and dabbed the paper at her eyes.  Investing in the heavy duty waterproof mascara had really paid for itself considering how often unexpected tears had been happening.  It almost seemed like whenever Spencer was near she teared up.  Hey eyes dried, she quickly set about finishing JJ’s water and her coffee, focusing on her breathing so that no one else would have reason to wonder if she was okay.  She wasn’t, but no one else needed to know that.

That night, Darcy pulled out her laptop once the first batch of cookies were in the oven.  She followed the very careful directions that Penelope had given her and composed an email under a new email address to the one Jane had used.

_It took me a few days to track down someone who could help me find a way to respond, but I could have spent an entire week just trying to sort out what all to tell you.  So, instead I’ll ask a question:  did you get a piece of Very Important Mail from me around 2 years ago?  You’ll know exactly what I mean if you did.  I’ve been writing you too, so obviously something is going on here.  Please make the subject of your next message the song I banned from the lab my first week with you so I know it’s you.  Love you too._

She had spent quite a bit of time deciding just what to say to Jane, but in the end, there was simply too much.  Knowing if Jane was even aware of the marriage was step one.  She briefly wondered if Jane was somewhere nearby, if they could meet up, but things were too precarious for that.  Right now all they knew was that someone was keeping them apart.  She had assumed Shield in the heat of the moment, but upon further reflection she realized it might be someone else. Getting together could be a big mistake if they didn’t know what they were dealing with.

The timer went off and she shut down her laptop.  She pulled the cookies out and set them in the cooling rack.  Then she slid in the next batch and started working on her icing.  She hadn’t done cookie decorating in a while, but she figured it was probably like riding a bike.  She’d make a few bad ones (that would never leave the apartment), but as long as she stuck with a less intricate design, she should be fine.  She had decided to go with a floral theme so she could present them to Penelope as a bouquet.  She hadn’t done cookies in over a year, but as she fell into the familiar routine she found it rather relaxing to stir the icing as she mixed her colors.  She might have to do this more often. 

The next morning, she made sure to arrive at work nice and early even though she had been up late working on the cookies.  It’s not like she would have been able to sleep anyway.  She wanted to beat Penelope in and leave the cookies on her desk.  They had turned out pretty well and she was proud of them, but a little worried that it would be seen as over the top.  Her hopes of a stealth drop off were dashed, though, when she walked into the office to find Penelope already there with Morgan and Spencer.

“Mornin’ Lewis,” Morgan said good naturedly.  “Whatcha got there?”

Darcy looked down at the box in her hands.  Oh well.  “It’s a thank you.  For Penelope.  She, uh, helped me with something personal yesterday and I really appreciated it.”  She handed over the box.

“You didn’t have to do anything.  I was happy to help,” she said as she opened the box.  Then she gasped as she looked inside.  “Are these cookies?  Because they look too good to eat.”

Morgan and Reid both peered into the box.  “Where did you get those?” Spencer asked.  “They’re really well done and I can think of a certain party we might want to buy some for.”

“Oh, I didn’t buy them,” she said somewhat shyly.  She had always been afraid to be boastful about her cookies.  One time Ian had made fun of them as “not a real skill” when he was teasing her, and it had hit a nerve he hadn’t known about. Though he took back the words immediately, it had always sort of stuck in the back of her mind as part of a refrain from an ex gone long before Ian that hadn’t been good for her sanity. 

“You made these?” Morgan asked.  “Damn girl.  You’re good.”  She gave him a small smile but didn’t say anything.

“We totally need to hire you to make some for the party.  If you have time that is.  These must have taken hours.  I can’t ask that of you, but I still want to,” Penelope said.

“It’s no problem.  I can make them,” she said a bit dismissively.  “It’s nothing that special.”

“Not special?” Spencer said looking at her oddly.  “You’re really talented.”

Darcy felt her heart break a little as she saw how earnest he was, how Penelope and Derek agreed.  She suddenly hated herself for thinking anything positive about Spencer Reid when her husband had been good, and kind, and had never said anything with the intent to harm her.  Comparing them was dirty business, brain, and was completely unfair to everyone involved.

She had spent the last 24 hours comparing Ian and Spencer for no damn reason.  What the hell was wrong with her?  She was really bad at this widow thing.  She couldn’t speak for fear of bursting into angry tears, so she just gave a small shrug that she hoped conveyed it was nothing before quickly looking away and wondering if it was possible to die of self-loathing.


	8. A Fresh Eye

Spencer and Penelope exchanged a look as Darcy made her way over to JJ’s office.  Morgan, apparently, didn’t notice anything. 

“So, ready to finish up the plans for JJ’s party?” That _was_ why they had come in early today, but now it seemed less important.

“Err, yes.”  He followed Garcia to her office while Morgan left them for his desk.  They didn’t speak until they were in her office and the door was shut.

“So something totally weird happened back there, right?” Penelope said as soon as the door clicked shut.  She placed the box of cookies on a small table.  “The way she responded to you saying she was good at making cookies wasn’t normal, right?”

Spencer almost sighed in relief at someone else noticing something being wrong.  “Yes!  She looked like she was about to cry!  And that’s not the first time.”

“Really?” she asked as she sat down in her chair.  “Interesting.”

“I’ve caught her crying five times.”

Penelope’s jaw dropped.  “Has anyone else seen it?”  He shook his head.  “So you’ve just been sitting on this for, what? The past week?”

“No one else seemed to notice!  Would you have believed me if I told you that she almost cried when I caught her sleeping on a desk and then woke her up?”

“Okay, probably not,” she admitted.  “But now I will, so we need to talk about this.  What’s going on with her?”

Spencer sighed.  “It’s me.  I don’t know what it is about me, but it’s me.”

“Ohhhh, maybe you remind her of her ex!”

“Her ex?”

“Yeah.”  Penelope snapped her mouth shut and scrunched up her face.  “She didn’t want me to tell anyone, but I think it might be relevant.”

“I can promise not to tell anyone?  Besides, it’s not like you’re spreading gossip.  It’s just you and me trying to figure out how to help her.”

Penelope thought it over, and for one, tense moment Spencer thought she was going to say no.  He didn’t realize how much he needed to talk this out with someone-anyone-else.  Though, if he had to pick someone, Penelope was probably the one he would pick.  They were very different in their tactics and would see things differently which would make for a more nuanced study.  Plus, she wouldn’t make fun of him or question his motives.  She would want to help a teammate, and he respected her dedication to being there for others.

“Okay,” she finally said.  “But it’s really important you keep this to yourself.”

“Absolutely,” he said instantly.  “All I want is to figure out why she’s so sad and help her.”

“She made me cookies because I helped her yesterday after you left.”

“Which we should also discuss.”

“Which we will add to our list to discuss.  Anyway, she wanted help figuring out how to send a secure, anonymous email to a friend because she thought an ex with some tech savvy was messing with her email and blocking their communication.  She said he had been controlling in the past, and it gave me chills to think that she could be so calm about him maybe monitoring her email.  How bad must he have been for her to act like that was just an inconvenience?”

“How could I be like him then?  I don’t think I’ve done anything controlling.”  His mind raced over all the interactions he had had with her.  Could something he had done been construed as controlling even though that wasn’t how he meant it?  Had he ever been too close to her, or in some way physically intimidating?

“Calm those horses in your head, Reid,” Penelope said, snapping him out of his thoughts.  “I don’t know what crazy trail your thoughts went down, but I don’t think it’s a bad comparison.  I was thinking more like you just said her cookies were amazing.  Maybe the ex had been a dick about them before and it made her uncomfortable.  Believing in yourself after someone messes with your mind can be hard.  Maybe she wasn’t sure how to process someone being nice for a change.”

“But as far as I can tell she’s not like this around anyone else. It’s incredibly unlikely that it’s always me being kind in a way he wasn’t.”

Garcia frowned.  “Maybe you look like him?”  He gave her a look.  “What? I could see her with someone that looks like you.”  She shrugged.  “I don’t know.  So far all I have is the cookie thing.  Maybe you should tell me more so I have more evidence to work with?  Maybe if we think about this like a case we can figure it out.”

“I’ll be right back.”

“Where are you going?  We’re just getting started.”

“I know.  I have a pad of notes though.  I can recall all of it, but sometimes it helps to look at it.”

“Of course you do,” Garcia said.  “Go!  Scoot!” 

He would have been offended, but she didn’t say it in a way that felt mean.  It was more fond, like she was reminding herself of something she knew about him.  It wasn’t a dig at him and his ways.  It was kind of nice, actually.  He grabbed the pad off his desk.

“Hey,” Morgan said, stopping him.  “You guys need help?”

“No, I think we’re fine.  Did…did you want to help?”  Morgan had cheered up a bit recently, but he was still a little off.  He wasn’t going to turn down an opportunity to help pull him out of his funk.

“Not really.  I just felt bad that you guys were doing it all on your own, so I thought I’d offer.  Honestly, I’m not good at that sort of thing.”

“Yeah, well, Garcia’s a wiz at it.  I’m more of logistics and checklists.”

“You two make a good team.”

“Thanks.”  He looked down at the notepad. “Are you doing okay?” It was impulsive to ask, but he felt the need to check.

“Yeah man, I’m fine.  Just tired.  There’s a lot going on.” 

“Do you need to talk about it?”

“I’m good for now.”

“But if that changes?”

“Look at you being all big brotherly.  Yes, Reid.  I’ll tell you if it changes.  Now get back to Garcia. You need to get that party planned already.”

Spencer gave a half smile and turned to head back to Garcia’s office.  His eyes caught the edge of a photo peeking out from under the desk calendar.  The brilliant red matched the coat that his girlfriend was wearing in the photo that used to grace his desk.  What did it mean that the photo was still there, accessible, but not in the frame?  Maybe she broke up with him and he wasn’t over her?

Another mystery that deserved time and attention, but perhaps he should stay focused on one thing at a time.  Morgan wasn’t breaking down into tears every day, at least not yet.

When he got back to the office, Penelope was typing away at her computer.   She didn’t turn when he entered, but once the door clicked shut she spoke.  “So the Bureau runs crazy checks on everyone before we get hired, but Darcy had already gone through the extensive checks to get her embassy job, so they only really looked at her recent past, which is clean.  No surprise there.  What _is_ interesting though is that there are holes both in her recent past and her less recent past.  It’s good, but I’m better.  Everything leaves a trail and I’m going to find it.”

“What do you think it is?”

“I’m not sure. But, taking what Darcy has told us as truth, which I’m going to do right now, I think it’s likely that the holes pertain to the ex.  They could be little things like applications for TROs that he blipped out of existence to keep himself looking clean. There’s also an entire encrypted classified section prior to her work at the embassy that tells me it wasn’t her first government job.  Whatever it was, though, is on super lockdown.  We’d have better luck getting her to tell us because I don’t think I could take it on without possibly being disappeared.”

Spencer sighed and sat down.  “That sounds a lot more serious than we thought a few minutes ago.”

Penelope turned to face him.  “Whatever is missing? It’s not good.  People don’t hide happy sunshine things, and they don’t hide even moderately bad things this well.  She’s facing something huge and she’s doing it alone.”

“Not for much longer.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you liked this chapter! I felt like you needed a little glimmer of goodness after the last chapter.
> 
> The little oneshot that had been rattling in my head is clearly more than a one shot. Sigh...brain! C'mon! BUT, I do have an actual one shot that I'm hoping to drop today in excitement over officially registering for my first grad school class.


	9. Progress

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Darcy has a case for the team.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> AHHH! So I disappeared because life got...weird. If you care to know, [here is what happened](https://cobaltskeeper.wordpress.com/2017/02/21/four362-done/). Basically I accepted and then rejected a job for what might be seen as a strange reason. It's been stressful.

Darcy was nervous about her first foray into the field.  She was aware how incredibly lucky she had been that she had gotten two uninterrupted weeks of training from JJ that she hadn’t had to apply in the high stress situation of actual field work.  However, that bubble was bound to burst, and it finally had. 

“This one,” Darcy said handing the file to JJ.  “We have to go.”

JJ took the file and flipped through it.  “Why this one?”

“The unusual nature of the ritual involved.  These scenes are clearly being staged to look one way, but the details are off.  Look at the photos.  It looks chaotic, but clearly there are pieces that are too perfect.  We’re supposed to look at this and think ‘cult’ or maybe ‘crazy teens,’ but the details tell a different story, one the local police seem unable to see through the haze of what the killer wants them to believe.  They want us because they think it’s freaky and us being there will help make a name for the town, but we really need to be there because their assumptions are all wrong.”

JJ nodded as she listened to Darcy.  “Okay.  I want you to present it to Hotch, and then the team if he agrees.”  Darcy nodded and followed JJ from their office to Hotchner’s.  He was surprisingly easy to convince and had even awkwardly patted Darcy’s shoulder and told her “good work.”  She wasn’t sure what to do with that considering she had just yesterday asked Rossi if Hotch hated her after he had yelled at her when someone else had knocked over her coffee cup.  “Go fill in Penelope, and I’ll tell the team that we’re meeting in 20.”

Darcy nodded and took off for Garcia’s office.  “Hey!” Garcia said brightly when she entered.  “We’re thinking Tuesday for JJ’s shower.  Does that work for you?  Can you have the cookies done by then? Oh, no,” she said taking in Darcy’s posture, “this isn’t a fun visit.  This is a ‘we have a case’ visit.”  She swiveled her chair back to the computer screens.  “Okay, tell me what you need.”  Darcy filled her in on which case file to pull up and they scanned in some of the pictures that weren’t currently in the police database so they could be projected during the briefing.  As they were getting ready to head to the conference room, Penelope surprised Darcy by pulling her in for a hug.  “I hope this case doesn’t make you decide that being here is a bad idea because I really like you and think you’re good at this, but this case is gnarly.”

Darcy leaned into the hug.  She hadn’t had a hug in ages.  “It’s not going to scare me away,” she said as she pulled away, “Momma’s gotta pay the bills.”

Penelope laughed, and they made their way to the briefing.

Darcy ran her hands down the front of her pants as she stood in front of the team while Penelope handed out folders. 

“Thanks Garcia.  This,” she clicked her handheld remote to bring up the first picture, “was McCall, Idaho, three days ago.  This, yesterday.  At both scenes three people were murdered through seemingly ritualistic means.”

“Seemingly?” Morgan asked.

“When you look a little closer, everything’s just a bit forced.  It’s a mess, but it’s an ordered mess.  The initial suspected cause of death was stabbing, but an autopsy results are not yet complete.”

“There’s an awful lot of blood, why not suspect stabbing?” Rossi asked.

Darcy used her laser pointer to circle the lips of one of the bodies.  “Right here.  Those lips look chapped but over her lip stick.”

“Poison,” Alex muttered.  “You’re possibly right.”

“So far there are 6 dead, and if they keep up with the pattern, three more will die tomorrow.  The rest of the information is in your folders and we can go over it on the plane.”

“Wheels up in ten,” Hotch ordered, bringing the meeting to a close.  Darcy let out a breath she didn’t realize she had been holding.

“Nice catch with the lips,” Alex said coming up to her.

“Thanks.  Is it normal that I’m not sure I want to be right?  Because those people still were alive when they were stabbed, the blood proves that.  I’m not sure if it would have been more kind for it to have been the stabbing or the poison.”

“None of it was kind,” Alex said with a hint of steel in her voice, “and we’re going to make sure that the justice system won’t be either.”  Alex gave a tight smile and then followed Morgan out of the room.

“You did good kid.  You have great instincts,” Rossi said as he patted her on the shoulder and then left as well.  Darcy looked over at the table.  Spencer was still in there.  She took a deep breath.

“Uh, Spencer?” she called.  He was clearly surprised that she was addressing him.

“Yes?”

“There were messages left at each scene.  I was hoping you would be able to take a look at it.  We need to know what they might mean and have a plan of attack for whether or not to release any of it.  Your insight would be helpful.”

He turned a sweet smile on her that made her stomach lurch in a not unpleasant way.  Ian used to smile at her like that when he was especially happy.  She tamped down those thoughts and waited for Spencer to respond.  “Of course.  We can look at it on the jet, if that’s alright?”

“Of course,” she said as Penelope and JJ looked between the two of them.  “That sounds good.  If you’ll excuse me.”  She pushed her way out of the room, not waiting for his response.  She had just basically condemned herself to sitting by him on the plane so they could go over things.  They would be right next to each other, heads bowed together over a folder.

She felt her pulse pick up at the thought and then was immediately annoyed with herself.  Why was she excited?  It was work.  That’s all.  It was a work conversation she was going to have with a work colleague. Nothing about that was wrong or inappropriate or in any way some sort of weird bit of seduction.  Why was she such a disaster?

Darcy picked up her go bag with more force than was probably strictly necessary, practically throwing it over her shoulder.  She closed her eyes and took a few breaths.  Who knew that yoga class she had taken back in London would be so useful?  It certainly didn’t limber her up any.  Something about short hamstrings, according to her teacher.  She may not have gained flexibility, but she had gained some good focusing techniques, so she considered it a win.  When she opened her eyes, JJ was standing there studying her.

“You okay?”

“Just a little overwhelmed after my first presentation and the field work ahead,” she said, punctuating it with a weak smile.

“Well, you did a good job, and I’m sure you’ll continue to do so.  I want you to take lead on this while we’re out there.  Run everything by me first, but I want to see what you’ve learned.”  Darcy nodded her acceptance, and JJ grabbed her own bag.  “Is there anything you want to tell me?” she asked awkwardly.

“Err, no?”  Darcy wasn’t quite sure where that had come from.

“Okay.  That’s fine.  But you know I’d like to be your friend too, right?  This doesn’t have to be a strictly work relationship.”

“Are you asking me out?” Darcy asked, both out of confusion and to lighten the mood.

JJ barked out a laugh.  “No, though, maybe a glass of wine or two after this one’s born?  Huh?  We’ve been so busy getting you up to speed that I barely know anything about you.”

Darcy just smiled.  That hadn’t been an accident.  She wasn’t sure she could talk about Ian without falling apart, nor Jane without possibly endangering her new friends.  Now was not a time to talk.  But…maybe?  She was surprised to realize it felt like something she could now feel herself possibly doing in the future.  Ian had been dead for just over a month, though.  Was she really ready to do something that felt like part of “moving on”?  Could she do it without feeling deeply guilty?

She wasn’t sure.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm heading to QuiltCon! I'll be in Savannah Thursday-Sunday! I DO have some built in down time that might be spent writing, but don't be surprised if I don't.


	10. Double Meanings

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Spencer is surprised by Darcy's request and contemplative about his interest in her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HOLY SMOKES. Guys, QuiltCon was AMAZING. It was a crazy inspiring 4 days. I took classes, saw breathtaking quilts, and met tons of cool people. I got home a week ago, and I immediately got to work on a quilt I'm doing for a charity auction. Then I interviewed for a job and GOT IT. It's nothing huge, just dishwashing and general assistant work at a board game cafe, but it's something (even if it's only 11 hours a week). I also have a potential virtual assistant job coming up, so that's great also. And in just a month grad school starts. WHEW. Needless to say, this took a little longer to come out than I had anticipated. I hope hings are going well for you!

Spencer had been impressed by the details Darcy had caught in the crime scene photos and description.  Not that he didn’t think she was smart enough for the job, but he thought it would take her more time to pick up on the inherently crime parts of the job since her background was in PR and not law enforcement or forensics.  He flipped through the folder as Hotch closed the meeting, intent on reading the whole thing before they got on the plane.  But that plan had been surprisingly put to an end by Darcy herself. When she had shyly asked him to help her look over the notes left behind at the scenes, he was certain the shock registered on his face.  Behind Darcy he could see Garcia trying to mime something with her hands and eyebrows, but he shook his head slightly to put her off until he had finished with Darcy.  Once she had left the room JJ wagged her eyebrows at him.

“You two could be cute together,” she sort of sang. 

He ignored the tiny tingle that went down his spine at the thought. “Because she wanted me to do my job to help her do hers?” he asked as matter-of-factly as possible.

“But she was all shy and cute about it!”

“I think she’s just nervous.” And he did think that. There was something else going on too, but he doubted it was attraction.

“Penelope, help me out here!”

“I think you’ll have more luck getting it out of Darcy,” she said with a shrug.  JJ let out a frustrated sigh and followed after Darcy.  “So,” she said turning to him now that they were alone, “this should be a good chance for you to see if you can learn anything more to help us figure out what’s going on with her.  You’ll keep me posted, right?”

“Of course.”

“Also, consider yourself lucky that I like you enough to have not said this next thing in front of JJ.  You totally blushed when she called your name.”

“I, err, what?  No.  No, I don’t think so.”

“I’m not saying it means anything.  I’m just saying it happened.”  He gave her a stern look.  “You know that won’t work on me,” she said breezing by him.  “You better hurry.  You have a creepy serial killer note reading date with Darcy!”

He rolled his eyes at her retreating back, but followed her out of the room to grab his bag and head to the plane.  If he allowed himself to think about it, he did have some concerns that he was interested in what was going on with her because he was physically attracted to her; because he saw potential to be emotionally attracted to her.  But she clearly wasn’t ready for that and unlikely to ever be interested in that way.  And he knew, well and truly, that his interest in her well-being was not out of some desire for her to hurry up and be ready for him, but rather because she was a person.  A person that was hurting, and that happened to be a large part of why he joined the FBI – to help people that were hurting, to use his considerable skills to make the world a better place one person and community at a time.  And Darcy was a person and she was part of his community.  And there was a significant likelihood that all they would ever be is coworkers, but that wasn’t the point.  Something was wrong and she deserved someone caring enough to try and help.  Everyone deserved that.

But helping people is difficult when they don’t want to say what hurts.

“Hey, you okay?”

Spencer thumped his head on the underside of his desk where he was pulling his bag from.  He rubbed the back of his head as he popped out from under the desk.  “Just fine.”

“You had a sort of faraway look back there,” Morgan said, looking at him more closely.

“Just thinking about the case.  It’s going to all come down to the details.”

Morgan nodded.  “An intense case for Lewis’s first.”  They made their way to the elevator.  “How you think she’ll handle the field?”

“Pictures are different from reality, but she was able to really focus on the details in the pictures so she’s probably not too squeamish. According to Prentiss she’s great at the PR side, so I guess we’ll see if that holds true when it’s more gruesome.”

“Talking to victim’s families isn’t the same as talking to the general public.” Spencer nodded his agreement with the statement.

They rode the elevator in relative silence and made their way to the plane without further conversation. Morgan’s head was in his folder, and Spencer’s was on her ex, if he was as bad as he and Garcia thought, maybe talking to families wouldn’t be so hard because she’d have her own experiences to draw on.  That’s something he would never wish on someone.

Once the plane had taken off, they settled in to discuss tactics for the case.  “Morgan and Blake, I want you at the most recent scene, Rossi and Reid to the ME.  JJ, Lewis, and I will head to the station to get things set there.”

“This is going to potentially be a minefield,” JJ said.  “They think they’re dealing with a freaky cult and probably won’t be open to any other interpretation, so we’re going to need hard, concrete evidence to the contrary before we can present an alternate idea to them.  When in doubt, let Darcy and I do the talking.”

“Any questions?” Hotch looked at the group.  “Okay.  Let’s hit the ground running on this one.”

The group broke apart, everyone moving into different areas of the plane to go over their folders.  JJ and Darcy softly discussed something, ending their conversation with a nod and then Darcy was moving over to the empty seat next to him.  She opened her folder to the picture of the messages and placed it on the table in front of them.  He had already read the letters multiple times by now, but he found himself suddenly having difficulty concentrating.

“I’ve read this three times now, and I think that it might be more than just a message.  I think it might be some kind of code.  I’m not sure what kind of code, though, and I don’t know if it means anything or if it’s another layer of subterfuge for the police.”

He had noticed the coded message as well, had even started decoding it.  She turned to him, expectantly, and he realized he had been sitting silently too long.  “Yes, I saw that too.  I, uh, already started working on the code.  It’s pretty simplistic, but it looks like they didn’t totally follow their own code completely.  There are a few parts that don’t make sense.”

“Show me.”

He pulled out his note pad and flipped to a clean page, scribbling down the message.  He circled a couple letters.  “See how the writing has random capital letters even though the writing is all the same size?  Those are showing the spaces between the coded words.  Each set is then an anagram.”

She ran her fingers over the first few words, brushing hands with him as she did so.  Unlike before, she didn’t pull away, possibly because she was too focused on her task, and he found that he didn’t mind the contact either. “The first few words are simple, ‘they,’ ‘will,’ but some of these are misspelled or we’re wrong.”  He was looking at her instead of his pad as she examined the paper.  She was focused but surprisingly calm given the situation.  She looked up when he didn’t respond to her comment and must have assumed he was looking at her out of shock.  “What?  I used to have a friend that was into anagramming.” Her face was briefly pained, but it was just a flash-gone as quickly as it had appeared. Maybe her anagramming friend was her ex?

“I think it’s more likely that it’s misspelled,” he said, searching her face.

“So what does it mean to be smart enough to set up this anagram code but misspell words?”

“I don’t know yet, but it’s something to pursue.”

She nodded and leaned back into her seat, lost in thought.

Spencer was too, just not about the note.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Also, do yourself a favor and google the best in show for QuilCon this year. It's a stunning piece that looks like a princess cut diamond.

**Author's Note:**

> Special thanks to everyone that encouraged this plot bunny, but especially Liebekatze for the idea of Darcy taking over for JJ.


End file.
